Dragon's Kin

by Anne McCaffrey

  “Dessert?” Master Zist inquired.

  “Well,” Kindan began, then blurted, “I was wondering if I could have some more stew.”

  Master Zist gestured to the pot. “There’s only you and me here, Kindan. You may have what you want.”

  As Kindan refilled his plate, Master Zist regarded him thoughtfully. When Kindan returned to the table, the Harper said, “When we are alone, Kindan, you may always help yourself. You just have to ask.”

  Kindan, mouth full of stew, smiled and nodded.

  “You had a lot of older brothers and sisters, didn’t you?”

  Kindan nodded again.

  Master Zist sighed. “I was the eldest in my family. I can’t quite imagine how it must have been for you. But I can guess that you were probably the last to get seconds . . . or dessert.”

  “It wasn’t all bad,” Kindan said. “Sis made sure that I always got to eat something.” He made a face. “But Kaylek always tried to steal my desserts, when we had them.” His face took on a sadder, more introspective look.

  “You didn’t get along with Kaylek, did you?” Master Zist inquired gently.

  Kindan shook his head. “No, not until just before—” He looked troubled. “Zenor, my friend, he told me that Kaylek saved his life.” Tears formed in Kindan’s eyes. “He was always mean to me, but he saved Zenor’s life.”

  “It’s a bit hard to grasp, isn’t it?” Master Zist commented. “I have been surprised how often people who only seem to be bad have turned out to be selfless when it really matters.”

  Kindan nodded in wordless agreement.

  “Kindan, do you know what harpers are supposed to do?”

  “They’re supposed to teach, and to sing songs at gathers, and play instruments,” Kindan said, not quite sure he had the right answer.

  Master Zist nodded. “That’s part of their job. Harpers also gather information and pass it along. We preserve knowledge. We help with the healers.”

  “My sister did some healing,” Kindan offered.

  Zist nodded acknowledgment. “And we also try to smooth things over.”

  Kindan looked puzzled. Master Zist sighed. “We listen to everyone and try to help when we think it’s appropriate.”

  Kindan tried hard to look as though he understood, especially because he’d finished his stew and his mouth was watering for dessert and he knew that Master Zist would keep on talking until Kindan showed that he understood what he was saying.

  Master Zist smiled in wry amusement. “We are trained to be good observers, too. Sometimes we don’t pay attention, but we’re trained.” He rose, taking Kindan’s dish with him, and served them the dainties that the baker had sent over.

  “A harper’s trained to watch and listen, as well as to play and sing,” Master Zist said after he’d had a bite of the dainty.

  Kindan nodded, his mouth full.

  “And a harper’s trained to keep secrets,” Zist added.

  “I can keep a secret,” Kindan said.

  Master Zist wagged a finger at him. “Ah, but there are some times when you have to let others keep secrets, too. Can you do that?”

  Kindan looked doubtful.

  “Well, we’ll see,” Master Zist said. “For now, I expect that you won’t try to overhear any conversations I have in my study or kitchen. If you hear something and you want to talk about it, you come to me. I’ll tell you whether it’s a secret or not. Can you do that?”

  Kindan nodded.

  “Good lad.” Master Zist finished his dainty, saw that Kindan had finished as well, and stood up. “You do the dishes and get some sleep. Tomorrow we’ll start with your lessons.”

  “Lessons?” Kindan repeated.

  Master Zist nodded. “Lessons,” he repeated. He nodded toward his study. “Harpers also take notes. Jofri left me his. And he noted that a certain son of Danil’s was not only good at singing but showed an interest in becoming a Harper.”

  Kindan’s eyes lit with astonishment. “He did?”

  Master Zist nodded solemnly, but his eyes were twinkling. “He did,” he affirmed. He waggled a finger at the door. “Now finish up and off to bed with you.”

  It seemed to Kindan that his new life was far more strenuous than his old life. And sadly, very different. He still had duty on the watch up the cliffside hundreds of meters above the mine entrance with its splendid view of what most folk simply called “the valley,” but which he and the Harper had started to call “Natalon’s Valley.” Now, however, he was not just one among the many but the lad placed in charge of all the younglings on watch duty. That job might have been Tofir’s or Jakris’s had they remained, but Kindan was shocked to realize that he was the oldest boy in the camp who wasn’t working in the mine itself.

  The first day he’d looked down from his perch and had seen Zenor, dressed in overalls cut down from a pair of his father’s, Kindan had felt a mixture of shame, awe, and sorrow. Shame that he wasn’t going down into the mine, as well; awe that his best friend Zenor was doing such a grown-up job; and sorrow to see the bitter proof of the disaster that had claimed not only the lives of his own father and brothers but also Zenor’s father and his childhood.

  But Kindan found that his new duties left him with little time to reminisce—whether on purpose or just because the camp was so short of able bodies he could not guess. When he was sure the watch was set up properly for the day and runners had been arranged to be ready at all the usual spots, he found himself in charge of a group of sturdy boys and girls nine and ten Turns old helping to trim the branches from trees felled the day before by the Camp’s adults.

  Zenor’s mother, Norla, found that her years of dealing with younglings were put to good effect as she found herself in charge of a daily crèche of all the Camp’s infants while their mothers helped out planting the fields below or working the herb gardens or helping cut trees into timber for the mine. It was, Master Zist had suggested, a good way to immerse her in activity while keeping her close to her youngest children. Before, the task had been rotated amongst all the women with infants, but now Norla’s cottage was filled with diapers in various stages of use, and mothers stopped in whenever they could to check on their babies, giving the widowed Norla more contact with the rest of the Camp than she would have had otherwise.

  The hill of coal on the other side of the valley from the mine grew steadily in size, but not without cost.

  Kindan heard but kept to himself many late night conversations spoken in low voices in the Harper’s cottage. With the exception of Tarik, nearly all the miners had come to pay their respects at one time or another to the new Harper. Many returned. All were worried.

  “Sure, we’re getting coal enough, but for how long?” was the common complaint. “Without new diggings, we’ll soon be reduced to either working the pillars or . . . just giving up.”

  Kindan hadn’t been surprised the next morning when he had been asked to explain to the MasterHarper what was meant by “working the pillars.”

  “A coal field’s a huge field underground,” Kindan had said. “There’s rock on top of it that’s pressing down. When we dig, we leave large pillars of coal untouched to help support the rock above—”

  “But that’s not the only way to do it, is it?”

  Kindan nodded. “You could build in supports and then pull out the pillars. In fact, if the field weren’t so huge, or when it’s finally mined out—probably not before the end of the coming Pass or even longer—”

  “More than fifty Turns?” Master Zist was impressed.

  Kindan nodded again. “The seam’s a good three meters wide, and there’s acres of it down there. The Camp would have to be proved and then they’d drill some more shafts, one for air and the other just for coal, and they’d probably make roads on the level wide enough for workbeasts to haul the coal out, instead of just men with carts or wheelbarrows.”

  Master Zist sighed, shaking his head at his own ignorance. “Let’s get back to the pillars.”

 
Kindan nodded. “The pillars keep the rock above the coal from bearing down on the field and crushing the coal. They support the weight. If you work your pillars—”

  “Then you run the risk of crushing the whole field?” Master Zist guessed.

  Kindan smiled at the Harper. “Exactly!” he agreed.

  “So when would it make sense to work your pillars?”

  Kindan shrugged. “I don’t know everything about mining, Master Zist,” he admitted reluctantly.

  “Just give me a guess, then,” the Harper allowed.

  “Well . . . I can think of two times: when you need to get coal out in a hurry and you’re not going to keep mining; and when you’ve mined everything else and you’re willing to build up new pillars to bear the load while you work the coal pillars,” Kindan said.

  “So either way, it’s the end of the mine, is it?” Master Zist asked.

  “Yes,” Kindan agreed in a troubled tone. If the mine were to close, he thought, what would happen to him?

  Master Zist must have guessed his thoughts, for he punched Kindan lightly on the shoulder. “Harpers can work anywhere, lad.” He looked at the window. “And speaking of work, we’ve both chores to get started.”

  Classes with the MasterHarper were different, too. They had been different before from those with Harper Jofri, but now, as a fostering in the Harper’s cottage, Kindan was aware of his unique position. He found himself backing Master Zist’s gruff ways out of his strong sense of loyalty, when before he would have done his stubborn best to undermine the Harper’s discipline.

  Dalor noticed it and said nothing; Cristov noticed it and taunted him about it. Tarik’s son had always lorded his position over the other children in the Camp, but now he took special pains to rub Kindan the wrong way, taking every opportunity to remind Kindan that he was now sleeping in his room and how nice Kindan’s old house was.

  Kindan took the abuse as long as he could, until one day he caught Cristov leaving the hold on his way back to his house for lunch. One deft hook of his leg and Cristov was sprawled in the mud and snow that was the pathway between Miner Natalon’s hold and the rest of the camp.

  “You need to watch your feet,” Kindan said to him roughly. “As well as your tongue.”

  Cristov jumped to his feet, but before he could do any more, a huge hand grabbed Kindan by the ear and dragged him back into the hold.

  “I’ll deal with this,” Master Zist’s deep voice said. Cristov’s opened mouth closed into a sly grin as he watched Kindan being hauled away.

  “Wipe your feet,” the Harper told Kindan when they reached the entrance to the hold. Kindan complied, still smarting at the grip on his ear, and followed the Harper back into the classroom.

  “Sit,” Master Zist ordered, indicating a seat at one of the long tables. Kindan sat and raised a hand to rub his injured ear.

  “Leave it alone, you earned the pain,” Zist told him. “Now I want you to tell me what you did wrong and what you should have done.”

  Kindan furrowed his brow and tried to ignore his sore ear. “He’s been saying—”

  “Remember that you’re training to be a harper,” Master Zist reminded him. “Words are supposed to be your trade.”

  “But—”

  Master Zist held his hand up, and Kindan stopped. “Tell me three good things about Cristov,” the Harper ordered.

  Kindan closed his mouth and thought. “Well, he’s strong.”

  Master Zist raised one finger and gave Kindan an encouraging look.

  “His mother likes him.”

  “That’s a good thing about his mother,” Master Zist said wryly.

  “Aren’t harpers supposed to be trained at the Harper Hall?” Kindan asked, hoping to change the topic.

  “A Master may take an apprentice wherever he is,” Master Zist responded, “and send him on to the Harper Hall later.” He raised his hand with the one finger extended. “But you have not finished.”

  “Um, well . . . he’s not good at figures . . . or writing—”

  “Those are faults, not virtues,” Master Zist said with a sigh.

  “I know,” Kindan protested, “I’m just trying to think—”

  “I see,” the Harper said. “Well, this is taking too long and we’ve both work to attend. So, to help you think, in addition to your other chores, you will go down to Tarik’s every evening after you’ve done your usual chores and wash all their clothes for them. You will continue doing this until you can report to me three virtues of Cristov. And you will apologize to Cristov for your behavior.”

  “But—but—” Kindan spluttered. “How will I get Cristov’s mother to let me do their laundry? I can’t imagine her being too eager to let me do it.”

  “How you get her to do it will be up to you,” Master Zist told him. “But do it, you will.”

  Kindan rolled his eyes.

  Master Zist wagged his finger at him. “I don’t think that rolling your eyes will work with Dara,” he said. He rose from his seat. “Get going; there might be a bite to eat left in the kitchen if you run.”

  “What about you, Master?”

  “I,” Master Zist stretched to his full height and assumed a lordly pose, “have a date with a young lady.” Catching Kindan’s surprised look, he added with shushing motions, “Go on! Off with you!”

  It took Kindan two grueling days to come up with three virtues Cristov possessed: honesty; loyalty; integrity. He managed to ingratiate himself with Dara by explaining that he had fond memories of doing laundry in his old house and could he please do a few loads for them to relive the memory? Cristov looked ready to die of laughter at the question and Tarik looked sour, as always, but Dara relented after giving Kindan a long, searching look.

  All the same Kindan was delighted when he reported his findings to Master Zist and got out of his extra chore.

  “Describe the house to me,” Master Zist ordered then.

  Kindan started to run down the layout of the house from memory, but the Harper stopped him with an upraised hand.

  “No, not how you remember it, how it is.”

  Kindan struggled to find words, fumbled, and shook his head.

  “A harper must learn to observe,” Master Zist said. “Wherever you go, you must be observant.” Under the Harper’s questioning, Kindan slowly recalled all the details of Tarik’s house and the items inside it. He was surprised to discover how much he knew of the state of the house, even though he had not consciously set out to learn it.

  “Good,” Master Zist said at last. “It is late—you’d best get to sleep.”

  Kindan looked rebellious.

  “Tomorrow, we shall meet at the Hold for the evening,” Master Zist said. “We’ll celebrate winter’s end, and I’ll need you to have your wits about you and help on the drums.”

  Kindan was surprised. Master Zist had started him working on the drums almost as soon as Kindan had moved into his cottage, but he had never suspected that the Master, always short of praise, would let him perform with him.

  “Don’t be so surprised,” Master Zist said. “I can’t play all the instruments by myself, you know. Now, to bed with you. Tomorrow will be long enough without the evening’s festivities at the end of it.”

  The next day Dalor had morning watch on the cliff heights. Kindan, woken up well before dawn by the Harper, had as his duty the setting of the watchers. After a hasty cup of klah—breakfast would come later—he set off in the dark looking to meet Dalor at the bottom of the path up to the cliff heights.

  The winter snow was still on the ground, but there had been no new snow for over a sevenday and much of it had turned to slush with the warming weather. Kindan walked carefully, enjoying the crunch as each of his steps broke through the thin layer of ice that had formed over the snow during the cold night.

  There was no sign of Dalor. He waited a few moments and then, aware that he had other duties, he set off for the hold.

  The instant he opened the door, he smelled trouble. The
re was something wrong with the air. He had learned enough about bad air in the mines to have some guess as to what had happened—the chimney had been blocked, or something had caused all the gases from the hearth to spread into the hold and not leave it.

  All his training told him to duck to the ground where the air was cooler and might still be breathable, but Kindan knew that time was of the essence.

  “Fire! Help, help! Fire!” Kindan shouted at the top of his lungs. He started fanning with the door to suck some of the air out, but he knew it wasn’t enough. He had to get a draft going. He ran from the kitchen door around to the front, all the while shouting as loud as his lungs would allow.

  At the front he opened the great doors of the hold and fanned them a few times.

  Master Zist came running over. “Lad, what is it?”

  “Bad air!” Kindan said. “I could smell it when I went into the kitchen for Dalor. I’ve got the door to the kitchen open and I’m trying to get more air in but—”

  “Fire! Help, help! Fire!” Master Zist bellowed. Shapes were approaching from different directions. Kindan looked around. Help might be too late. He ducked into the hallway.

  “Kindan!”

  “It’s okay,” Kindan shouted back. “I’m little, I don’t need as much air as others. If I can get upstairs, I can open the windows and maybe wake them up.”

  The air on the stairways was definitely bad, Kindan realized as he started up them. He took a few good lungfuls and then held his breath, suddenly grateful for the dares he’d had with Kaylek on who could hold their breath the longest. His eyes were stinging as he reached the landing. His fingers fumbled with the window latch, but he got it open finally and took a few deep breaths before he turned to the bedrooms.

  He opened the first door, ran into the room, and heaved open the first window he could find. He heard the shouts of others entering the house and running up the stairs. He shook the person in the bed—it was Dalor. Dazed and confused, Dalor looked up.

  “Come on, Dalor!” Kindan shouted at him. “Bad air, come with me!” Suiting actions to his words, he grabbed Dalor’s arm. Shortly, he had the other boy leaning against him and started him out of the room, fighting his own light-headedness as he did so.